Here is a roundup of the best news and analysis published by Financial News's daily website during the second quarter of 2012.

• April

April 2: The BBA’s Knight’s tale
– Almost five years to the day since Angela Knight started as chief executive of the British Bankers’ Association, the UK trade body representing more than 200 banks, she revealed she was to step down in the summer.

April 3: FSA fines JP Morgan Cazenove’s Hannam £450,000
– The FSA carried out one of its highest-profile censures to date in its clampdown on market abuse with a £450,000 fine against Ian Hannam – JP Morgan Cazenove’s global chairman of equity capital markets.

April 16: Billionaire head of BTG Pactual faces trading investigation
– FN revealed that André Esteves, the billionaire chief executive of the Brazilian investment bank BTG Pactual, was under investigation for trading undertaken in his personal account in Europe in 2007, according to the prospectus for the bank’s initial public offering published this month.

April 25: BofA Merrill hits back with senior UBS hire
– Bank of America Merrill Lynch hired Alex Wilmot-Sitwell from UBS as president of Europe and emerging markets (ex-Asia), the exact position to which Andrea Orcel was due to be promoted before he defected to the Swiss bank in March.

April 26: The uncertain sale of Deutsche Asset Management
– Deutsche Bank was seeking to unload a large chunk of its asset management business but, in the bank’s earnings call, one analyst forgot to turn off his microphone, and let slip that “they can’t get this business sold”.

• May

May 1: Bats Europe completes Chi-X integration
– Bats Global Markets passed an important milestone in its merger with Chi-X Europe by combining the operator and its own European venue on to a single technology platform.

May 9: Ex-Dresdner Kleinwort bankers win bonus battle
– A group of 104 ex-Dresdner Kleinwort investment bankers won their dispute against their former employer, after a London judge ruled that the bank broke its promise to pay guaranteed bonuses to them in 2008.

May 14: High-ranking trio to depart JP Morgan amid trading blunder
– Three high-ranking officers at the centre of JP Morgan Chase’s giant trading blunder were expected to leave the firm, sources said, as losses on the trade increased.

Expected to leave were Ina Drew, who ran the Chief Investment Office – the risk management group tied to the losses, since 2005; Achilles Macris, who was in charge of the London-based operation that placed the questionable trades; and also trader Javier Martin-Artajo.

The trio exited because of their direct involvement in the mistakes that led to the losses. Drew set the trading strategies for the CIO unit, and Macris and Martin-Artajo were responsible for carrying out her instructions and overseeing the problematic portfolio.

Another executive who departed was trader Bruno Michel Iksil, nicknamed the ‘London Whale’ for the big positions he took in credit markets on behalf of the CIO.

May 16: FSA bans BGC’s Verrier in staff-poaching fallout
– The UK Financial Services Authority banned Anthony Verrier, a senior executive of interdealer-broker BGC, from working in the UK financial services industry after relying on findings by a High Court judge that it said raised questions over his “honesty, integrity and reputation”.

May 18: Facebook IPO in numbers
– Facebook set the final price of its hugely anticipated initial public offering, which, at $18.4bn, would have made it the fifth largest global flotation, assuming all the share options were exercised. According to Dealogic, the only other IPOs that had been larger were Agricultural Bank of China, Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, AIA Group and Visa.

May 25; @GoldmanSachs embraces PR in 140 characters
– Goldman Sachs launched its Twitter account at its AGM and by the end of the day had managed to attract nearly 9,000 followers with just three tweets.

@GoldmanSachs began tweeting with the message “We are now live on Twitter (finally) at the GS Annual Meeting. Follow us here for updates on our work, our research, and our people.”

But if followers were expecting to get any updates on the AGM, they would have been disappointed. A couple of hours passed with no mentions until the meeting was over. Goldman then tweeted: “Annual meeting is a wrap. Prelim votes show all directors elected with overwhelming support. Shareholders support GS on all proposals.” By December, the US bank had attracted more than 30,0000 followers with around 750 tweets.

May 30; High Court judge denies appeal on €52m bonus dispute
– A High Court judge denied Commerzbank an attempt to appeal a ruling that said the German bank had broken a contractual agreement with 104 former Dresdner Kleinwort employees over unpaid bonuses.

May 31: Deutsche Bank’s Ackermann bids farewell after decade at helm
– Deutsche Bank chief executive Josef Ackermann told the German bank’s shareholders of his sadness at stepping down after a decade as he prepared to pass the baton to Anshu Jain and Jürgen Fitschen.

• June

June 12: Rolet ushers in new era with management rejig
– The London Stock Exchange Group announced a series of high-profile changes to senior management and board. New figures included Alexander Justham, the former director of markets at the Financial Services Authority, and David Warren, a former chief financial officer at Nasdaq OMX.

June 12: Meet UK banking’s new lobbyist
– FN profiled Anthony Browne, who was named as the replacement for Angela Knight as chief executive of the British Bankers’ Association. Browne brought to the position a mix of political, media and financial experience.

June 15: HKEx pulls ahead in race for LME
– A nine-month bidding war for the London Metal Exchange swung in favour of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, after the UK group recommended its bid over an offer from a US rival. The deal also continued a successful advisory run by the financial institutions group at Rothschild.

June 18: Plus Markets secures vote for Icap sale
– The fate of Plus Markets Group had various twists during the year after the company had attempted to put itself up for sale, but failed to attract enough interest for the whole group. On May 14, the company announced it had decided to close after failing to find a buyer.

Plus Markets shareholders were unhappy about the company’s decline. Speaking to Financial News, Spencer Wilson, a representative of Plus Markets’ second-biggest shareholder Amara Dhari, said: “We believe the group’s management has destroyed shareholder value in the business. For some time now, we have been trying to have a constructive dialogue with the board and its advisers, with little success.”

On June 1, Icap took pole position in its bid to acquire the junior exchange business Plus SX and its prized exchange licence when Plus management said it favoured the interdealer-broker’s offer over a rival proposal from Gulf Merchant Bank. On June 18, Plus Markets secured the votes to pass through a sale to Icap at an Extraordinary General Meeting, after Icap raised its original bid from £1 to £500,000.

Plus Markets’ other two businesses were later sold. The derivatives exchange Plus DX was sold to Pipeline Capital, a company which is run by DX’s former managing director Clive Connors. Plus also agreed to sell its technology solutions arm, Plus TS, to a consortium of employees and investors led by Hirander Misra, a technology consultant to Plus and the co-founder of Chi-X Europe.

June 21: Nasdaq unveils European derivatives ambition
– Nasdaq OMX said it planned to launch a new London-based interest-rate derivatives platform, making it the latest exchange to attempt to break into the tight-knit European derivatives market.

June 22: Ricci handed sole control at Barclays CIB
– Barclays named veteran banker Rich Ricci as the sole head of the corporate and investment bank, as Jerry del Missier, his former co-head, moved into another high-profile role – chief operating officer for the group.

June 27: Barclays bosses rule out bonuses after racking up $450m in fines
– Four of Barclays’ top executives pledged to give up their bonuses for this year after the UK bank accumulated more than $450m of penalties for its role in the setting of Libor and its European equivalent.

June 29: 3i to slash staff and office network
– UK-listed alternatives firm 3i Group, under new chief executive Simon Borrows, postponed plans to return to the fundraising market until at least the end of 2013 and outlined a drastic round of office closures that would reduce headcount by over a third.